Fonzey

Just paid for a Harvey Smith trick 3bolt up-pipe to go with my TD05 20G. Should be a match made in heaven :)

One step closer to figuring out if these will be adequate. Looked at the bolt head of one of my new ones and it said "10.9" on it. Stuck it into Google and found the following page: http://www.boltdepot.com/fastener-information/materials-and-grades/bolt-grade-chart.aspx 10.9 suggests "Alloy Steel, Quenched and Tempered" and is "middle of the road" in terms of strength. I get the feeling my OEM bolts will be unreadable due to rust, but will attack them with a wire brush next time my wheel is off and see what I can work out. If they're 10.9 or less, my new bolts should be fine. Even if not, at least I know what to look for and can go out and buy some 12.9's or whatever. If anyone has remarkably clean suspension strut bolts, feel free to go read the number written on the bolt head :D

Yep I'll probably never know if the solid bushings caused it or the over torqued bolts. I'll never refit the solids now, its far too much effort for an experiment!

Thanks Jay :) I mentioned in my thread that I fitted some solid linkage bushings and I wasn't quite happy with the NHV which they were potentially causing. I removed two of the bushings (one on the gear leaver and the "stay" bushing) as they were easily accessible and put OEM back. That fixed the whine, but I continued to have a horrible grumbly/scraping/knackered bearing type sound effect when off throttle. This sound went away when I pushed the clutch in, or got back on the gas. A couple of "specialists" thought the box needed dropping and splitting, to replace one of what could be several bearings. I was unable to replace the final two bushings for OEM because I lost half of one of them :( I've been searching for quite a while to buy a replacement but it became apparent that I needed to spend £100 on a linkage bar which included the bushings. I nearly did that, ordered from a Subaru dealership who had to back order from Japan - 4 weeks later I go to collect it and he ordered the wrong bit I've had the week off work this week, so finally I couldn't take the waiting anymore so I decided to fit the remaining complete bushing that I had, plus half of the other one When I first did the job, I opted to disconnect one of the linkage UJ type things whilst it was still attached to the gearbox which meant that I couldn't really torque the bolts up properly due to access. This time I decided to remove the whole lot from the car, so first off was the entire gearbox support: I then had to knock out a roll pin which held the linkage onto the selector thingy in the gearbox, bit of a pain but with a few socket extensions and a punch - I managed it eventually. Few more bolts, and out she came: When dismantling the joint which contained my target bushings, I got the feeling I may have done them up too tight last time :look: Quickly knocked out my solid bushings, leaving half of one in place: Then rebuilt with the OEM ones, at proper torque. Getting everything back on the car was a proper pain in the ****, combination of my jack/stands not being high enough for me to raise the car much higher than the depth of my face ( ) and poor access, but after an hour or two everything was back into position and torqued up appropriately. Had to go for a shower as my back was killing, and I was covered in grease - but shower and fresh set of clothes later and it was test drive time. I was properly skeptical, but to my surprise it actually !Removed! worked Soooooo happy/relieved/etc. I had mentally set aside the £1000 or more to drop the box and have it opened up, so well happy. Boring update, but a big one for me

We can come to some kind of finance agreement :P They will be "difficult" to sell, in hindsight I should have gone for the much cheaper BC BRs for my usage but these ERs will make great track suspension for someone!

If you're a vulture trying to give me money, vulture away! All I ask is that you're aware of what coilovers they are. Not sure how to say it without sounding patronising as you're probably well aware, but I had a gent at a meet offering me second hand BR series money which is a little low for the ERs! Full adjustable mounts included front and back, ready to go! £950 would be my target :)

Considered this also, the threads are absolutely fine - if anything it's the bolt head and nut that is a little tired from a few years of breaker bar abuse I guess. I've got some of that Bilt Hamber Deox Gel coming to do some other stuff, so might try that on them - then paint the unthreaded parts with Hammerite smooth or something. Not sure how long that would stand up to spanners though, and likewise leaving them uncoated would likely rust in minutes!

I was in a Subaru Dealership, so thought I'd ask the parts guy for a price on the rear hub:strut bolts (y'know the 19mm ones, two on each strut?). He wanted £40 PLUS VAT for the four bolts to cover the rear!! I was only asking because mine look rusty as hell and ruin the look of my coilovers! I went to a generic nuts and bolts shop and got four of these, with washers (no flange bolts) for £7... Can you see a problem with me using these when I next get the chance? They're identical thread/pitch/length/width but the heads are 22mm rather than 19mm and the threaded portion of the bolt is longer (the OEM ones are unthreaded for the full width of the hub knuckle). Oh, and they're not "flanged" so hence the washers. Not sure how bolts are rated in terms of strength/torque etc, don't want to risk a disaster just because I'm a tart...

Hi All, I'm all signed up and paid. We're thinking of driving down the Friday night so let me know any details of places worth checking out/booking etc. Good opportunity for some pre-show beers n' that :)

Done, paid, etc :) I was knackered for Trax, any Travelodge recommendations close to the venue?

I appreciate the comments, thanks team! This is the first car I've actually worked on before, so pretty much everything I've done has been a learning experience. I've made a few mistakes with choice of parts for my application which has cost me money, but it's all part of the fun!

Thanks Gambit, with that in mind I'll just pay the £22.50 and not tell the missus. As far as she's concerned, the tickets she bought got us in :D I shall fill the form out tonight. Thanks again!

By my calculations, the image limit is 8... segmented and posted. SPAM! http://uk.subaruownersclub.com/forums/topic/4905-2005-impreza-sti/?p=26760

:D Control switches in the ash tray. Even after the cash spent at Chevron, and all their efforts - I'm still not happy with the BC's. They're quite noisy due to solid top mounts, and are slowly wearing me down. I saw these come up on eBay - so took a punt: They're KW Variant 3's. In certain need of a rebuild, so got them off to KW as I type this. I've also got the springs off to a powder coater. I plan to fit these with Group N rubber top mounts to quieten things down for me on my daily drive, and hopefully sell on the BCs. They'll be an excellent track car addition, but they're not for me. Phew, that's a lot of crap - sorry. There has been LOADS of other minor tinkering I didn't bother mentioning, but hopefully there will be more to come this year :) If you got this far, get a life - but thanks for reading :P

... and spent some more money!! It's a Harvey Smith TD05 20G. Plans are to have it rebuilt with a billet compressor wheel, then fitted along with a FMIC, Headers, Uppipe and Injectors some time later this year. Steering rack bushing kit went on, much better: Then Disaster :( I thought I'd blown my headgasket, turns out my radiator was just leaking. The Rad was actually only 11months old, forgot to mention in this thread but Richard Henry had replaced my old rad as the old one was leaking. This meant warranty fix, love it! Then my car got treated to a trip to Stafford, and the team at Chevron. I'd never been completely happy with my BC's on the road, so give them the challenge of setting up ride heights, alignment and damping rates to try and fix that. After a couple of weeks, Simon and the team had provided me with a job list they'd like to do - so I let them rip: 1) Replace CDF stuff with Whiteline, my control arms were rubbing on the ARB due to how much castor I was running 2) Custom Chevron control arms for more castor 3) Setup and Rideheight Went with Whiteline adjustable links too: Next up, well the red LCD clock was shortlived...

I then got a day booked at Cadwell Park. So much fun, absolutely loved it and the car didn't miss a beat. Back home, apologised for beating it so hard and rewarded with a wash! Next up, finally after months! Red clock: It's an EVO7 clock with a red filter. Did a DIY 6month oilchange:

Roll centre kit: New ride height: Got it aligned locally, car felt excellent when pushing on - possibly a bit too firm/focussed for the ride to work though. I had Trax and some track time coming up, so made my own camera mount from a second hand dome light fitting: Trax was an EXCELLENT day, track time was a bit intimidating though - not much etiquette to be had and I was VERY slow tbh! The car was great on everything other than braking. I killed my Kevlar pads within three laps :( The track bug had bit though, so a bit of shopping awarded me: In "race" trim :P

Went out for a drive with a friend, got some photographs. I like this one: I picked up an engine bay dressup kit at somepoint: And some solid gear linkage bushings from AS Performance: I have to say, in hindsight - NOT a fan of this mod. Transmission NHV is just on the wrong side of acceptable for me. Still looking for OEM bushings to return to standard tbh. I then did a bit more shopping... Familiar sight! Why no droop?!

After: Finally it was service/remap day: Ultimately gained about 8bhp with the decat over the PPP sports cat. Yeah! Next up was an amp install, to give the speakers a bit more... noise. (it had aftermarket cheap pioneer speakers in it):

Awesomeley wrapped by me. Cable tie came off, it was just to hold it whilst I lockwired it: Then it was time to give the car a DIY detail, it had been about 6months since Mike had the car: Before: During:

After: My KMH-MPH convertor had been intermittently failing, so ended up with some HawkUK clocks: With my wheels back home, got them lathered up with Poorboys: aaaaand fitted: It was coming up service time, so bought some extra gubbins: Sparkplugs, 255lph fuel pump and 3port boost solenoid. Oh and some decat bits and a deresonated centre:

Needless to say, I snapped two bolts which were seized in the Brembo's. I was SO annoyed and ended up being a week of car on stands. Luckily, Steve @ SD Motorsports is quite local and helped me out with some drilling and tapping. Disks: There we go... I was terrified of more trouble on the rears, so decided to let Andy & Co have a look at those at Richard Henry. As it happened, they needed a bolt drilling too. Teeheee. Andy also fitted my CDF stuff whilst the car was there, and gave me an alignment setup: Oh look, my wheels are off again... time to get them powdercoated :) Whilst at the painters, I cleaned and re-undersealed my arches: Before: During:

Before: After: The LCD clock would annoy me for some months to come... Next up a delivery from Godspeed: ...and Chris @ CDF! Brake fitment day: Old hose: Braided hose: THE WORST DAMN THINGS IN THE WORLD:

My driveshaft inner CV fell apart inside the boot Luckily, a friend was on hand to help rebuild it with some new grease: Back on all fours: Car felt much better, and quieter! Next up was some bonnet struts: I decided to get all sparky next, and sort out my mishmash of dash lighting. My red clocks and head unit looked ace, but the other green crap didn't.

Car had a few issues, a balljoint needed replacing, top hose was about to blow and some other minor niggles - so got them all sorted and found the engine to be running sweet. The car was a PPP spec, and the previous owner had it to Andrew Carr. On the way home from SClinic, I heard a new whistle whilst boosting. To cut a long story short, I spent weeks troubleshooting this... had the exhaust off, gaskets changed, checked all pipes, went back to SClinic... couldn't find anything. Eventually, in the snow I went to Richard Henry Auto's in Bradford and we found a snapped bolt on the inlet manifold. Andy & Co refitted my manifold after drilling the bolt and voila... whistle fixed. One weekend whilst cleaning, I found a disturbing piece of the cars past history under the carpets... I keep telling myself it fell out of his pocket whilst on the way to his mistress or something, but deep down I can just picture him spooning in a flacid ***** on the back seat :( To take my mind off of it, I bought a new part: For some reason, in all my photographs there isn't a finished picture in this part of the timeline... so you'll have to wait! Since buying the car, I'd had the infamous rear strut clunk. I wanted to try the nipple mod before buying coilovers, so I picked up some cheap struts and prodrive springs on SNet - and got to work nipple modding those instead... Fitment day came, I'd never changed suspension on a car before - but I'd read a million guides and had the torque specs in memory! Yucky old: A bit nicer to look at... On the final corner, disaster struck...